Tom Brake: The success of the Marshall plan for Africa will depend to a great extent on the additional funds from the international finance facility, yet there are great concerns about the way in which it will operate. Louis Michel, the EU Development and Humanitarian Aid Commissioner set out his concerns in a letter to me, in which he said he was anxious about its governance,
	"the way its resources would be allocated and spent, and perhaps most importantly, the danger it might pose to aid flows after 2015—when repayments to the IFF would exceed its disbursements"
	to developing countries. Does the Secretary of State wish to reconsider his response to me on 15 December 2004, when he said bluntly that he would not consider alternatives to the IFF? Will he agree to liaise with Treasury officials, who are looking at alternatives set out in, for instance, the Landau report?

Hilary Benn: No, I do not take back a single word, because as countries increase their aid programmes to reach the 0.7 per cent. UN target we face a challenge. We now have the timetable that the Chancellor announced last summer. We have 10 years to go until 2015, but we cannot wait until then because it would be too late to raise the necessary finance to deliver increased aid and join the battle against HIV and AIDS, get more children into school, and employ more doctors and nurses. The question for the House and every country is how we raise the additional finance for development today. The international finance facility now has support from France, Germany, Italy and, most significantly in one sense, Sweden, which announced just over a month ago its willingness to participate in the pilot project with GAVI—the Global Alliance for Vaccines and Immunisation—which we think could raise an additional $4 billion and save an extra 5 million lives over the next 10 years. If not the international finance—

Hilary Benn: I am all in favour of focusing on the challenge of global poverty and I welcome support from every quarter it comes from. There are promises and commitments that people and parties make, and there are things that Governments actually do. If people look at the Government's record, they will see that we have not just promised to increase development assistance and to do all the things I outlined—we are actually doing them. That is the choice that people face.

Alan Duncan: Perhaps the Secretary of State can steal a phrase from his own manifesto and look forward, not back, and desist from deceitful party fundraising, asking for party donations on the grounds that we would cut spending, which is patently untrue. It is obtaining money by deception.
	Bad government is the enemy of good aid. In addition to greater donor activity, there need to be African solutions to African problems. Does the right hon. Gentleman agree that the Commission for Africa will deliver results only if it requires each and all of the participant African countries to subscribe to a collective commitment to govern well? Without good governance the Commission for Africa will not succeed. Does the Secretary of State agree?

Paddy Tipping: Will the Minister accept that there is a serious crisis in Africa, where around 10 million people are co-infected with HIV and TB? TB cases are rising by 4 per cent. a year in Africa, but in parts of the region only one in three have a full course of TB drugs. Will that issue be raised at the G7 summit?

Hilary Benn: As part of most of our activities in Africa, we work with Governments and civil society to tackle corruption, strengthen the means of democracy and build states that are accountable to their people. We also support the African-led peer review mechanism, which reviews country performance in governance and development. Peer reviews are already underway in Mauritius, Ghana, Kenya and Rwanda, and the first two should be completed by this summer.

Andrew Selous: Would the Secretary of State agree—[Interruption.]

Andrew Selous: Would the Secretary of State agree that if we are, rightly, to make poverty history in Africa and elsewhere, good governance is indispensable; and that African leaders' side of the bargain is to push for peaceful democratic change and to say clearly that corruption and money laundering are as unacceptable in Africa as anywhere else?

Hilary Benn: I would agree entirely, because corruption gets in the way of promoting economic development and investment. Recently, I was in Zambia, which is taking a strong lead in the fight against corruption. I applaud that and the British Government are supporting that lead.

Tony Blair: First, of course it is true that house prices have increased in the hon. Gentleman's constituency and in constituencies throughout the country. We have an immensely strong economy under the Government, with low inflation, low mortgage rates and low unemployment. However, it is important that we continue with the investment that we are making in public services.
	We have looked carefully at the Liberal Democrats' spending plans, especially their plan to get £30 billion off top-rate taxpayers by raising the top-rate of tax from 40 per cent. to 50 per cent. and introducing a local income tax. However, having looked at them, we decided to reject them.

Michael Howard: The Government said a month ago that the existing Act
	"remains . . . valid, enforceable and effective"
	and that in
	"exercising the powers . . . the Secretary of State is . . . acting lawfully".
	That is what the Government said about the existing powers one month ago. We have said that we will co-operate with the Government in renewing those powers. We have said that we will co-operate with the Government if there is a sunset clause in the Bill. I have come to the conclusion that this Prime Minister wants this Bill to fail. He wants to pretend that he is the only one who is tough on terrorism. Is not it a dreadful measure from a desperate Prime Minister, and should not he be thoroughly ashamed of himself?

Tony Blair: It depends on whether the Attorney-General actually attends Cabinet. In the instance that is being raised in the newspapers this morning, the Attorney-General himself came to Cabinet and therefore gave an oral report on his advice.

Tony Blair: I can assure my hon. Friend that 20,000 extra community support officers will be delivered if this Government are returned to office. That, of course, is in contrast with the Conservatives, who want to freeze the Home Office budget and would end up cutting the number of police officers—as, of course, the right hon. and learned Member for Folkestone and Hythe (Mr. Howard) did. That investment in our police services, and in education and health—under this Government, at least—would continue.

Ian Paisley: Will the right hon. Gentleman take it from me that his condemnation of, and further exhortation to, the leaders of IRA/Sinn Fein is useless in Northern Ireland's present drastic and tragic circumstances? When is he going to take action? We have a statement from the IRA that is a statement of intent to murder. Those who made that statement and who mentioned in it people who can be identified are not even going to be called in for questioning, according to the Chief Constable. Surely intent to murder is a crime under the law and should be dealt with no matter who does it—be it Sinn Feiners or anyone else.

Tony Blair: I have had the opportunity to consider those proposals, which emanate from Liberal Democrat Members and I have to say that I entirely reject them. What we now have is a proposition that allows us to have our universities properly funded and allows students to go through university without paying tuition fees at the time, backed up by a fair system of repayment. That avoids both the need to force students to live at home and the need to impose real rates of interest on student loans, which is the Conservative party policy.

Michael Fabricant: On a point of order, Mr. Speaker. Like you, I support the important campaign "Make Poverty History", which is fully endorsed by both sides of the House. However, you will have noticed that a number of hon. Members are wearing arm bands today. If you cannot do so now, will you issue a statement later about the appropriate dress code for the Chamber?

Gerald Kaufman: I am grateful for the opportunity to open this debate on the BBC and the report by the Select Committee on Culture, Media and Sport that was published on 16 December. I pay tribute to my colleagues on the Committee of all parties for the work that they have done, which has led to our producing a unanimous and consensual report. I also pay tribute to the Clerks and their staff for the work that they have done not only on the report but for the Committee throughout the year.
	We have a plethora of documents to consider when debating the BBC. We have the Select Committee report and the Secretary of State's reply to it. I am grateful that she published the reply at the same time as the Green Paper, which we are also considering. We can consider the documentation and inquiries that are relevant to charter review that have been conducted by the Office of Communications. We also have the documents from Lord Burns and the various inquiries conducted by Tim Gardam, Philip Graf and Professor Barwise. Indeed, it is impossible to count the number of trees that have died during the process of the charter review. I shall address the issues in a moment, but one argument for not having charter review could be the ruinous impact that producing such documentation has on the landscape.
	I thank the Secretary of State not only for publishing her reply to the Committee report at the same time as her Green Paper last week, but because that Green Paper acknowledges the work of the Committee and, in whole or in part, accepts several of our recommendations, although not all of them, as I shall have cause to point out. I know that the United Kingdom Film Council is especially grateful that she accepted our recommendation on a film investment strategy.
	The background to both our report and charter renewal is the dramatic change in the audiovisual environment since the National Heritage Committee, which I chaired at the time, produced its report that led to the present 10-year charter and the continuation of the licence fee as the method of funding the BBC. It is a remarkable that in 1998 not one single house in this country had digital television—all television signals were analogue—yet today more than half of all households have it. It is partly thanks to initiatives taken by Sky and the hugely imaginative launch of Freeview that the number of houses with digital television will increase almost exponentially. About 5 million houses have Freeview boxes at present, and it is thought that by the end of the year there may be 10 million. That will, among other things, lead us forward to the practicability of digital switch-off.
	The fact that we now have digital TV channels and, as the Secretary of State said in her statement last week, there are more than 400 television channels with more to come, has had a dramatic effect on the audience for the old analogue channels, which are also available on digital television. In 1993, BBC1 and what is now ITV1 had three quarters of the entire television audience in this country. The latest figures show that that three quarters has fallen to less than half, and figures published in the last few days show that ITV is continuing to lose its audience. In his memoirs, Greg Dyke interestingly points out that the only reason that BBC1 remains the channel with the largest number of viewers is not because it is doing well but because ITV1 is doing even worse.
	We have also moved forward from a situation in which, ever since the foundation of the British Broadcasting Company in 1922, we have been used, as radio and television channels have increased, to every viewer having access to every channel. That is no longer the case and it will never be the case again.

Gerald Kaufman: When BBC2 was launched nobody could get it, because it broke down on the opening night. The production of "Kiss Me, Kate", the main programme on the opening night and to which I was greatly looking forward to watching, had to be postponed until the next night. The point that my hon. Friend makes, like the point made by my hon. Friend the Member for Greenock and Inverclyde (David Cairns) a moment ago, is very valid indeed. If we are to have a new BBC charter, and if it is to be based on universal access, I hope that my right hon. Friend the Secretary of State will pay careful heed to those of my hon. Friends who live in areas that do not have the access available to people such as my constituents in Gorton who live in big cities. The interventions of my hon. Friends make the interesting point that viewers or would-be viewers consider access to programmes and channels their right. That is appropriate.
	We are moving towards a situation in which, despite the rather obtuse recommendations in Professor Barwise's report on digital TV, more and more channels are niche channels. Even BBC1—with less than a quarter of the viewers still the biggest channel in the country—is becoming a niche channel, too. Special interest channels are important; for example, Artsworld and Performance, which I understand has difficulties—I hope they can be solved. As the Green Paper points out, there is little of interest on either BBC1 or BBC2 before 7 pm; the arts are almost gone from BBC1 and "Panorama" has been banished to late on Sunday evenings.
	It is important to note that people go on about the BBC as though it had been carried down from Sinai by Moses on tablets of stone and there is something holy about it that applies to no other broadcasting organisation. In the end though, as Alfred Hitchcock said to Ingrid Bergman when she was complaining about the interpretation of her role, "It's only a movie, Ingrid". In the same way, in the end, the BBC is only a broadcasting organisation—very important though broadcasting organisations are, and particularly important as the BBC is.
	Although it emerges from the material that my right hon. Friend the Secretary of State has published that the idea of public service broadcasting originated in the United States, nevertheless the embodiment of public service broadcasting is the BBC. We would not use that phrase as we do if the BBC did not exist. When one listens to excellent broadcasting organisations in other parts of the world—for example, CBC in Canada—one can hear or see the influence of the BBC and Lord Reith on what was, when it was developed in the United States, first in radio and then in television, simply a mechanism for selling goods and attracting listeners and viewers through programmes that would get people to listen to or watch the commercials.

Gerald Kaufman: I agree with my hon. Friend, and of course, there is a very good chance that that can be rectified when the BBC moves to what it calls its hub in Manchester. I cannot think of any city—or, indeed, any locality in the entire country—to which it is more appropriate for the BBC move to try to deal with the concerns that my hon. Friend expresses.
	We who serve on the Select Committee on Culture, Media and Sport accept, as we did 10 years ago, that whatever concerns one has about the licence, it is the only viable way to fund a public BBC, but I would tell my right hon. Friend the Secretary of State that we, like her, having accepted that the licence must continue, ask that certain matters that relate to it be rectified because the BBC is in the unique position of being the only collector of its own funding—the only hypothecated tax in the country, and the only one collected by its recipient with rules laid down by the recipient. I am sure that every hon. Member will know of examples from her or his constituency of the anomalous regulations that relate to the licensing, or otherwise, of sheltered housing. When I had a certain problem in my constituency, I wrote to my right hon. Friend the Secretary of State. She referred me to the chairman of the BBC, who referred me back to my right hon. Friend. What we did not get in the end was a solution to the issue, and I am grateful to her for wanting to find one.
	I hope also that my right hon. Friend will move forward from what she says in her Green Paper about the penalty for not having a licence and accept in full our recommendation that failing to pay for a licence should be decriminalised and become a civil offence. All the statistics show that the predominant number of those who fail to pay for their licence are single mothers on low incomes, and turning them into criminals is not acceptable. Incidentally, to continue the ghastly campaign by the BBC, warning us in the most threatening, Big Brother way that we will all become criminals if we do not pay for our licence is unacceptable. In my own case, I was sent a threatening letter, asking me why I had not paid my licence fee, when I pay it by direct debit—thus showing that the way in which such matters are dealt with is not absolutely brilliant.
	Meanwhile, I hope that my right hon. Friend will consider adopting the recommendation that issuing fixed penalty notices may well be the best way to deal with those who fail to pay for their licence. When we were discussing my right hon. Friend's statement last week, I became conscious of the fact that there is a lot of support for the view that, although some of us have accepted with varying degrees of enthusiasm or reluctance that the licence is the most appropriate way to fund the BBC, we believe that it is the most appropriate way to fund only the BBC and that the recommendations made in several quarters to top-slice it to fund other public service broadcasting is just not acceptable. Our constituents will be just about ready to pay the licence fee to fund one major broadcasting organisation, but I do not believe that the use of the licence fee as a kitty to finance other ventures will be acceptable to the overwhelming majority of licence fee payers.
	I am very sorry that my right hon. Friend did not find it possible to accept our recommendation that the BBC should be placed on a statutory basis, rather than via a charter. I understand completely her concerns about any possibility of either Government or Parliament intervening in the workings of the BBC, but let us consider Channel 4, which has been a statutory organisation throughout its existence—through the wisdom of Lord Whitelaw, who was responsible for its foundation—as has S4C as well. Channel 4 has been, if one sets aside the Hutton episode, far more controversial during its existence than the BBC has ever been. It has a far more aggressive news programme than anything that the BBC screens or broadcasts, yet nobody has ever been concerned for a moment that Channel 4 would be subject to interference from the Government or from Parliament. I hope that before we get to the White Paper my right hon. Friend may be willing to reconsider the recommendation.
	One of the issues to which I have already referred—my right hon. Friend rightly devotes considerable space to it in the Green Paper—is digital switchover. We are reaching a time when digital switchover, for most people, will not be a problem. People are moving towards reception of digital TV themselves, either by Sky, cable or Freeview. It is extremely important that nobody should be excluded from digital reception when the switchover takes place. The recommendation that we make in paragraph 3 of our report is that the Government should give
	"serious consideration to the need for measures . . . to make digital switchover affordable and practical to people on low incomes and those with special needs."
	I do not believe that that has been given sufficient attention by my right hon. Friend in the Green Paper. I hope that as she moves towards the White Paper she will accept that it is an extremely important matter.
	Like a number of my hon. Friends who are in the Chamber, I represent a constituency with a good deal of deprivation, with many people living on benefits. That is through no fault of their own. It is extremely important that such people, often with young children, should not be excluded from TV reception when analogue is turned off.
	What my right hon. Friend sets out in the Green Paper with regard to governance, with more than a nod to the Committee's report, makes a great deal of sense, but with one exception. The exception is my concern at the idea of the chairman of the BBC being the chairman of what my right hon. Friend calls the BBC trust. The huge mess into which the BBC got itself under Mr. Davis and Mr. Dyke was due, to a considerable degree, to Mr. Davis defending, almost obsessively, the system of BBC governance. There was the notorious Sunday evening meeting, for example,
	Many of us who are delighted with the appointments of Michael Grade and Mark Thompson are worried that the Green Paper and the charter and agreement might be, as it were, fashioned in their image. We cannot always rely on such absolutely first-class people holding the two top positions in the BBC. Indeed, the people who they succeeded were very far from being absolutely top class, and that is me being kind and generous. Whatever my right hon. Friend fashions, I put to her that it should be in place to deal with the worst contingencies rather than leaving them to the albeit admirable people who now run the BBC. I am pleased that in the Green Paper my right hon. Friend accepts what we are saying in our report about the need for professionals who understand the media and business to be on the BBC trust. We have only to look at the antics of Dame Pauline Neville-Jones, who claimed to cause a fuss about the Hutton issue while at the same time going on the "Today" programme regularly to take sides on the Hutton issue, to realise how important it is that we get the right people.
	I hope that while my right hon. Friend pays attention to our recommendation that what she calls the trust should sit in public, she will decide that it ought to sit in public, as the Federal Communications Commission in the United States does, for example. In this country, in many public bodies, there is too much of a net curtains attitude—the idea that things are too important to be conducted in front of the children. The children in this case are the people who pay the licence fee and fund the BBC. I hope that my right hon. Friend will think about that tendency. I hope also that she will have another think about making the details of BBC finances available to the National Audit Office.
	In a curious way, all of us—with misgivings and with some disagreements—have reached a consensus about the future of the BBC. That is right because it is an exceptionally important broadcasting organisation. I hope that high as our opinion is of Michael Grade and Mr. Thompson, they will not be complacent in believing that all the problems are over. By the time that the White Paper is published, I hope that my right hon. Friend will have assuaged some of the misgivings that remain so that we can all go forward to support the BBC into the wholly digital age.

Michael Fabricant: This is a rather belated intervention, but as my hon. Friend mentioned "Yesterday in Parliament", he may like to know that I have received an e-mail from the BBC that says that an Evening Standard diary column that claimed that the programme was to be scrapped was "completely untrue" and that it would continue in perpetuity. The last two words are my own, but nevertheless, my hon. Friend will understand my gist.

Michael Fabricant: I am following my hon. Friend's argument with considerable interest. Does he agree that, if the BBC, or indeed any state broadcaster, were wholly and exclusively to confine its output to that which is different from the output of popular broadcasters or commercial broadcasters, its output would, by definition, be unpopular? In that case, how might it sustain its licence fee?

John Whittingdale: That could certainly have a great deal to do with it. I believe that the BBC is finally trying to put that right, but of course generations of BBC employees have already been recruited through the pages of The Guardian.
	It is not satisfactory for the BBC to continue to regulate itself in this regard. Ofcom is already responsible for adjudicating on complaints about impartiality in the commercial television sector, and the BBC should be so regulated.
	Another area that requires external regulation by Ofcom is that of the enforcement of the BBC's fair trading commitment. Commercial broadcasters, suppliers and other organisations have complained for many years about unfair competition from the BBC and abuse of its market powers. Yet time and again those complaints have been considered for a period by the governors only to be ultimately dismissed. Outside studies such as the recent Graf report on BBC online services and the Lambert report on 24-hour news have shown that changes were necessary, but the BBC has had to be dragged along kicking and screaming.
	There is real concern that the BBC continues to abuse its position. I will give two examples. The first concerns the competition to provide subtitling services to Channel 4, which the BBC won with a bid that was widely believed to be way below cost. As a result, the commercial organisation that had thought that it stood a good chance of winning lost out. The BBC says that it has looked into it—indeed, the chairman told me that, having carried out a thorough investigation, he is absolutely satisfied that the process was entirely fair. However, the figures have not been published and there remains considerable suspicion on the part of the commercial providers.
	The second example concerns the requirement by the BBC that songwriters and composers should sign up with publishers who are selected by the broadcasting organisation, which then receives a cut of subsequent royalty payments. That strikes me as wrong and anti-competitive. The BBC is not the only offender—indeed, others are worse—but the BBC has a duty to set an example and should not continue that practice.
	The BBC should come under external regulation for both matters. The Secretary of State said that she would consider allowing Ofcom to adjudicate on matters that relate to the fair trading commitment. That is a step forward but I hope that she will go further than considering it and actually do it.

Don Foster: The hon. Gentleman made an important point about songwriters and musicians. Is he aware that the issue is not being addressed only by Ofcom but that there is rightly an Office of Fair Trading investigation into the matter?

John Whittingdale: I was aware that the OFT had received complaints and I hope that it will deal with the matter.
	I share the view of the right hon. Member for Manchester, Gorton (Sir Gerald Kaufman) and my hon. Friend the Member for Ryedale (Mr. Greenway) that the National Audit Office should have proper access to the BBC. It is extraordinary that the BBC benefits from £2.8 billion of public money and yet is still not subject to the same scrutiny as all other Government bodies. The Public Accounts Committee has repeatedly raised that matter, yet the Government, for reasons that I do not understand, appear unwilling to allow access. It would enormously improve transparency and accountability if the NAO were given full access.
	Everybody agrees that there is a need for change in governance. The Secretary of State said that the status quo was unsustainable. The new chairman of the BBC made moves to give the governors much more independence and to set up an arm's-length arrangement whereby they have their own staff. Although that is an improvement on the current position, it does not go far enough. That was Lord Burns's conclusion. Indeed, he proposed a unitary board of executive and non-executive directors and a new, independent and separate public service broadcasting commission, which would oversee the use of public money. Ofcom strongly supported that model, which was also supported by Greg Dyke, who said that the Secretary of State should ignore the bleating about the proposals that she was bound to get from people, including the current governors, and simply implement Burns's suggestions.
	Despite all that advice, the Secretary of State has chosen to adopt a compromise solution of a BBC trust. Yet the trust remains part of the BBC. It will be chaired by the BBC's chairman and the Government will appoint its members. It is difficult in practice to perceive any genuine difference between the new BBC trust and the arm's-length arrangement that the chairman of the BBC proposed. The Government have instituted a change but it does not go nearly far enough.
	The Green Paper takes steps in the right direction but does not go far enough on various aspects. My hon. Friend the Member for Ryedale mentioned independent production. The BBC has been subject to a quota for independent production since 1990. For three years running, it has failed to meet it. Indeed, the proportion decreased year after year. The BBC moved to fulfil the independent production quota only when it was threatened with the possibility of Ofcom imposing fines on it.
	I welcome the director-general's new proposal of a window of creative competition but it does not go far enough. There should be a 50 per cent. maximum for in- house production, as "Pact" recommends. The Secretary of State has hinted that she will consider that but I hope that she can say that she will go further.
	The BBC should also go further in disposing of its commercial operations. It has agreed to dispense with some of its operations under the worldwide umbrella but it will retain magazine production. The reason why the BBC needs to be in the magazine publishing business is beyond me.
	The Select Committee was right that to say that the licence fee is regressive and unfair. It is essentially a poll tax. Yet, unlike the poll tax that Labour Members condemn, it does not even provide for assistance for those who can least afford to pay. Every year, some 100,000 people are fined for failing to pay the licence fee. In 2003, 20 people went to prison because they could not afford to pay the fines. It is incredibly expensive to collect—it costs some £150 million and the Select Committee has rightly drawn attention to the campaign with menaces that the BBC adopts to intimidate people into paying. Despite that, it suffers from widespread evasion, with approximately £200 million lost through evasion every year.
	We are at the point even now when 7 per cent. of people do not listen or watch the BBC. That number will grow and it will become unreasonable to prosecute people or send them to jail because they fail to pay a licence fee that increases every year to finance programmes that they choose not to watch or channels that they cannot receive.
	The Government's adviser, Lord Burns, said that, over time, sustaining the licence fee will become increasingly difficult. Yet, in the Green Paper, the Secretary of State said that it would continue for at least another 10 years and that consideration of alternatives will not even begin for five years. It is a complete surrender. No wonder The Times described the document as a "yellow paper" rather than a Green Paper. We must tackle the issue now.
	The Government have also ducked Lord Burns's recommendation that there should be contestable funding for part of the licence fee, which provides some solution to the problem that Ofcom identified of how we continue to have public service programming on the commercial channels, when the value to them of the analogue spectrum diminishes every year.
	The Government, in the Green Paper, have essentially ducked every serious challenge. Despite all the consultations, debates, advisory panels and reports given to them, the conclusion in the Green Paper is that the charter will be renewed for another 10 years, the licence fee will go on for another 10 years and the BBC will continue to govern itself. The Government have stuck their head in the sand and shied away from any significant change. The Green Paper is a lost opportunity, which we will wish to address.

Derek Wyatt: I begin with an apology: I have a ministerial meeting at 3.30 pm and I shall therefore be absent for the winding-up speeches.
	I thank my right hon. Friend the Member for Manchester, Gorton (Sir Gerald Kaufman). On Monday, we held a dinner in his honour because he has chaired the Select Committee for 13 years and he will not chair it again. The high esteem in which he is held was shown by the attendance of so many hon. Members who served from 1992 to 1997 and from 1997 to 2001. We have enjoyed the fun and especially the intellectual rigour under his chairmanship.
	Let me consider the duration of the charter. We have Departments for education, health and foreign affairs. Does anyone in their right mind believe that we will not have such Departments in 10 years? Of course we will. Does anyone in their right mind believe that the BBC will not be here in some form in 10 years? Of course it will. Why, therefore, do we need a charter for 10 years? Why is that such a magical period? The charter's duration has always been inconsistent—for example, it has been for nine months and for three years. Why, when we are confronting the greatest change in technology, should we consider granting the charter for 10 years? We must be careful. I do not accept that it is being renewed for five years with a review. The BBC will always be with us, so what is so precious about 10 years, five years, one year and so on? That debate has not been held in the public domain.
	The debate is especially important now because, if we had held it three years ago, no one would have mentioned an iPod or broadband. Those two innovations alone have caused phenomenal change in the way in which we do business and conduct ourselves around the world. Who is to say that there will be no son of iPod or son of broadband in the next two or three years? The pace of change will increase phenomenally and any public sector broadcaster needs to change at the same pace. That is impossible and, therefore, although I do not believe that the argument about the duration of the charter is fatuous, I wish that it would go away. There will always be a BBC and I support the Select Committee's recommendation for a statutory basis. That is the easiest and cleanest way to resolve the matter.
	There is another reason for putting the arrangements on a statutory basis. When we want to put a question about the BBC on the Order Paper, we have to go through an interesting process. I had to ask the Clerks whether could I table the question, because it does not come under the jurisdiction of the Secretary of State. I did that, but I was then told that it did actually come under the jurisdiction of the Secretary of State but not of the House. So I wrote to the Secretary of State—not the present one—and he said, "Actually, it is not my jurisdiction. It is the jurisdiction of the governors." So I wrote to the chairman of the governors, and he said that the matter did not come under his jurisdiction, but under that of Parliament. These things go round and round. If the arrangements were put on a statutory basis, there would be an obligation to answer such questions.
	All the fudging that we have talked about this afternoon has been talked about for quite a while, including issues relating to the National Audit Office and other things that we want. Our discussions are taking place round the edge of the issues because we cannot get to the meat. We cannot get what we want, but we should be able to, because we are elected Members acting on behalf of the public. We should be able to cross-examine the BBC in real depth, especially on its accounts. I hope that the Secretary of State will give some more thought to the statutory versus charter argument, and to the length of the charter.
	On independent productions, not only has the BBC failed to reach its targets, but I do not think that it wants to reach them. This presents a big cultural problem. Let us raise the bar to 50 per cent., because that would make the BBC achieve 50 per cent., and let us make that a minimum. How should we do that? Let us consider what the BBC is proposing and try to understand the model involved. Let us imagine that I am the head of BBC documentaries, for example, and therefore also the commissioning head of BBC documentaries. I would get inside offers as well as outside offers, but I could not be impartial. Will the Government consider the ITV network centre model that was created 10 years ago? It operated under a different regime, in which there were many more independent television operators. Under that model, bids had to be made to centre and against the independents. The head of drama or documentaries at ITV network centre would then say, "This is the best proposal; we will go with this." That was quickly accepted as the best model. One of the reasons that the 25 per cent. target cannot be achieved is that the system is not transparent inside the BBC. If the BBC cannot solve this problem, we will have to do it for them. It needs a model like the ITV network centre model that will give people inside and outside the BBC the chance to bid. Such a system would be fair. The present system is not, which is why we have problems.
	I am uncertain about the move to Manchester, because Manchester is already a substantial artistic and cultural centre in the north-west. If Government regions have to look outside the M25 and take poverty indicators into account, I cannot see why the BBC should not have to do the same. What is wrong with Sunderland, for example? I cannot see what would be wrong with establishing another media centre somewhere else in Britain. Leeds, Birmingham and Manchester are already well established.
	Furthermore, the £500 million cost of the move to Manchester is simply unacceptable. It equates to the cost of five major hospitals or 40 community hospitals, and such expenditure is intolerable. Under the proposed trust, a director-general could say, "We are moving to Manchester", only for the trust to say, "Oh, hold on. We haven't approved that." That would upset all the staff involved and all sorts of discussions would ensue about which departments were moving and which were not. That is not the way to run a company. I shall give the new trust some time, but my instinct tells me that the governance of the BBC should involve a FTSE 100 system. If that works for the companies involved, it should be good enough for the BBC. I would use that method to run the BBC, rather than having a trust.
	I am a huge fan of top-slicing. If it was correct, in the 1920s and 1930s, to see the BBC as a cultural icon for the nation—in a different way from how it is seen today—and if it was correct for it to have five orchestras, why is it not possible for the BBC to have a film centre? Film is one of the great cultural institutions in this country, so why does not the BBC make films? I do not see the logic there. If the BBC is a great cultural icon with five orchestras, it should also make films. Less than £10 million of the BBC's, £2.7 billion income went into making films, yet it has bought £78 million-worth of American films to be shown in Britain. All that money could have gone to our nascent, youthful film makers here. Why should they all have to go to Hollywood? Top-slicing is critical in that regard. We could include a film option. Why, too, is there no community channel in the BBC? Why are there no education, arts or sports channels? Why is there no UK film channel?
	The BBC now has BBC3 and BBC4. Before that, it had BBC Prime and BBC Choice. They lost between £500 million and £600 million, and hardly anyone watched them. Still no one watches BBC3, and only a few people watch BBC4. They cost £120 million each, which is a huge sum. The BBC might not want to provide them, but people out there would like an arts channel, a film channel and a sports channel. How can we get a public sector broadcasting model that is more nimble and nifty if we do not have top-slicing? I encourage the Secretary of State to think again about that.
	On the question of Ofcom and who should regulate the BBC, it would be ironic if the public service publisher model were delivered by Ofcom—however it might be funded—resulting in Ofcom regulating a brand-new public service publisher but not regulating the BBC. That would be madness. The regulator must ultimately be Ofcom. That is logical. It would not be sensible to set up an alternative Ofcom just for the BBC. Will the Secretary of State think again about the role of Ofcom in this regard?
	On how we are viewed overseas, we talk about the BBC being one of the great bastions of broadcasting, and it is. The BBC World Service is sensational. It is one of our great cultural battalions overseas, along with the Open university and the British Council. However, BBC World television is not sensational but embarrassing. BBC News 24 is not good—it, too, is embarrassing. If the BBC cannot do that properly, why do not we put out a tender and ask UK companies to run those two channels? I bet that ITV News, Sky and the BBC could come together to run a really effective BBC News 24 on half the money that is currently spent. I bet, too, that that would produce a cultural icon that would represent the best of the BBC and provide all the necessary programmes from the independents. I no longer accept that the BBC is the best in that field, and that is a problem that has not been examined properly in the Green Paper.

Don Foster: I assure the hon. Gentleman that that is not the view of people at S4C. We should also try to agree on the current value of those 10 hours of programming, and then agree to enable S4C to negotiate with the BBC on how the money can best be spent, rather than being tied to a fixed number of hours.
	As I said on the day the Green Paper was announced, I broadly agree with a great deal of it. Unlike the hon. Member for Maldon and East Chelmsford, I believe that many of its proposals deserve support. I especially welcome the Government's agreement to continue the licence fee and not to allow top-slicing. As the Select Committee said, the licence fee is not perfect; it might be better described as the least worst of the options currently available. If we reflect on the alternatives, we see why that is so.
	In fact, there are only two key alternatives. One is direct funding by the Government of the day. In Australia, a 25 per cent. reduction in the funding of public service broadcasting has been accompanied by increased Government interference. If we want an independent BBC that is well and securely funded, that is not the route we should take. The other option is subscription, advertising or pay-to-view, but all those would lead to the BBC's rejoining the ratings war to secure the maximum number of viewers to boost advertising and the number of pay-to-view clients.
	If we do not choose any of those options, as I hope we will not, we shall be left with the licence fee as—with all its faults—the least worst option. As I have said, I am delighted that the Government have agreed to retain it and also to retain the charter for 10 years. That is a crucial decision.
	I welcome the Green Paper's proposals to define the BBC's service remit more tightly—although it is fair to say that the BBC has already been moving in that direction, with the help of Michael Grade and Mark Thompson, both of whom deserve the praise heaped on them by the right hon. Member for Manchester, Gorton. The Government have added to the original five proposals a sixth relating to the BBC's responsibility for helping to drive forward the switchover to digital. As I said to the Secretary of State—I did not receive an answer on that occasion—I hope that we do not expect the BBC to take all the responsibility, because that is a job for the Government. I also hope that we do not expect it to write a blank cheque. The Secretary of State should give us some idea of how much money the BBC can reasonably expect to receive. She said earlier that that would be specified in documents still to be produced, and I hope that it will.
	My one significant disagreement with the Government and the Green Paper concerns the governance of the BBC. I think the whole House accepts that we cannot continue the current arrangements, with the BBC both flag-waver for itself and its own regulator. Under its new chairman, the BBC has already embarked on a bid to separate the governors from the rest of the corporation, but they are still part of the BBC, and the proposals in the Green Paper would perpetuate that. I do not see how the trustees can be truly independent of the BBC. At the very least we need an independent governance working alongside Ofcom to regulate the BBC, but I would go further: I would prefer a totally independent regulator with responsibility for all public service broadcasters, ensuring that they all met their individual remits.

John Grogan: That is a good question, and the governors have a big role to play in the next few months in ensuring that quality is maintained in areas where cuts and savings are made. For example, a saving of 10 per cent. in respect of some local radio stations could make a big difference to quality.
	Mention has already been made of parliamentary coverage, and I am pleased to hear that "Yesterday in Parliament" is safe, but I hope that coverage of political conferences is also safe. Such coverage, which the BBC has previously contemplated cutting back on, is an important function of the BBC. It is important that it maintain a quality presence in those areas, and the governors have a key role to play in insisting on that.
	I welcome the many white tinges to the Green Paper. On the licence fee and governance in particular, the BBC needs to start planning almost immediately for the future. I do not believe everything that I read in the papers, but the Secretary of State does appear to have had a considerable political victory, about which I am pleased. Those two chaps Burns and Birt are indeed noble Lords, but they seem to spend far too much time hanging around No. 10, which is good neither for them nor the nation—golf is a good and much-recommended alternative. Their agenda involves slicing up the licence fee and introducing a public service broadcasting commission, but I have doubts about both. If one top-slices the licence fee and gives it to commercial broadcasters, it will be difficult to convince oneself that the programmes that such broadcasters then make would not have been made anyway. That is a fundamental difficulty with that suggestion.
	I disagree with the detail of Lords Burns' and Lord Birt's proposed public service broadcasting commission in a number of ways. They are suggesting that the chair of the BBC executive board be appointed by the Government. That would be a retrograde step for the BBC's independence. When it comes to the stewardship of the BBC, I believe that the new trust model has much to be commended in exclusively representing licence fee payers. The public service broadcasting commission would have the power, as I understand it, to top-slice the licence fee, which would be for ever hanging over the BBC, leading to confusion and continual lobbying.
	I am glad that the Secretary of State decided that Ofcom should not assume a greater role. It is establishing itself as a regulator, among other things, of commercial broadcasting, and the skills involved in that are very different from those required to regulate public service broadcasting.
	I had the pleasure of attending a BBC function last night. I have at least two roles in this Parliament: one is chairing the all-party BBC group, the other acting as vice-chair of the all-party Mongolia group. The BBC has just produced a programme on Genghis Khan—classic public service broadcasting that will go out at prime time in April. We had a preview of the programme last night. The BBC is known throughout the world, and in Mongolia particularly, for the World Service and for the output of BBC journalists. I hope that the BBC will produce such quality programmes and put them out at prime time for many years to come. BBC 1 is still the most popular television channel in our nation. It is a channel that people dip in and out of and gain experiences that they would not otherwise have. I commend the Green Paper and hope that it will soon be a White Paper.

Andrew Robathan: It is a pleasure to follow the hon. Member for Selby (Mr. Grogan). We last participated in a debate together on Second Reading of the Communications Bill some two and a half years ago, when we clashed slightly. I have always enjoyed his speeches and we shall miss them after the next general election.
	I come to this debate as a layman, and I want to express a layman's view. I have to confess—it is a confession, having sat through debates on the Broadcasting Act 1996 and the Communications Act 2003—that I want to convey the impressions of many people in this country, which are certainly borne out by my constituents.
	I was brought up on the BBC after the war, when schoolmasters used to tell me about the opening bars of Beethoven's fifth symphony, which presaged the news and used to go out around the world. It was heard by the resistance in France. The BBC was a great national institution of which I and my parents were proud. I thus approach this debate on the BBC more in sorrow than in anger.
	I was brought up on Reith and Reithian principles. I was brought up hearing the news read by Alvar Liddell—[Interruption.] A bit before my time, perhaps, but I think he was still alive then. I was also brought up on the World Service, which provided a fantastic image of Britain around the world. We always watched the BBC news because is was self-evident that it would be better than any other news provision.
	There have been dramatic changes. I realise that the future of the BBC is a very complicated matter. I do not want to go into too much detail about the Green Paper, but to point out how the BBC has changed for the worse. If the BBC can be reformed, so be it, but it does not look much like it at the moment. We have heard about the dumbing down of the BBC, and spending licence payers' money on makeovers of people's houses and gardens is, frankly, pretty shocking—and many of my constituents agree. There is "Fame Academy", whatever that may be! It is certainly not what the BBC was set up to produce.
	No longer does the BBC provide what everyone wishes to watch. I watch the World Service, or worldwide television as I believe it is now sometimes called, from time to time when I am abroad with the International Development Committee. I have to say that it is not producing the image of Britain that I would wish to see portrayed outside this country. I find it extraordinarily politically correct and not at all what I would like to see.

Andrew Robathan: I am not quite sure which colleague the hon. Gentleman refers to.

Andrew Robathan: As it happens, I recall it being said when I was at Oxford university that if anyone wanted to get a job in the BBC, it was necessary to be really left-wing, because Conservatives do not want to change things, which is not very interesting, whereas the left want to change things. A friend of mine, who is still with the BBC, bears that out. I am not sure whether it is populated with dangerous left-wing radicals, but I suspect that many there are left-wing.
	I want to point out, by referring to the Gulf war of 2003, where the BBC has particularly let us down. I supported the Government's position on going to war and, funnily enough, unlike some Labour Members, I still do. Speaking as a former soldier, I understood a little of what was happening on the ground, but I found that BBC reporting seemed more designed to back up the anti-war sentiments and prejudices of some reporters. After hearing that the British Army was "bogged down" and had moved only 100 miles in a couple of days, I eventually switched off the BBC and started watching Sky. I reiterate the point that I am someone who was brought up to believe that the BBC was the best news channel. It was clear that the BBC reporting of the war was biased and, frankly, it still is. I say this not in defence of the Government, but I often notice that, in respect of what is happening in Iraq, the negative aspects covered by BBC journalists are much greater than the positive aspects.
	The hon. Member for Leigh (Andy Burnham) asked me about political bias in the BBC. James Naughtie, in a dialogue with a Minister last week on the "Today" programme, spoke about "when we win" the election. I have to say that that is both extraordinary and telling. I do not know James Naughtie, but I do know which way his politics lean. The Government complain about the BBC—we know that it has been critical of the Government from Hutton and so forth—and it is interesting to note that the BBC tends to criticise the Government from the left, not the right.
	Many MPs wake up to the "Today" programme. Having reflected on it yesterday, I was driven to participate in today's debate by listening to the "Today" programme this morning. Two things emerged from it. First, the BBC no longer reports the news on a programme such as "Today"; it prefers to make it. This morning, it featured an undercover investigation of an event in a prison in Scotland. I question whether it was right for the BBC to send an undercover reporter there. Is the BBC there to report and inform or to make the news? That seems a perfectly fair question. That problem crops up all the time. The story made the headlines in the news, but it was actually only a story about what the BBC had done.
	What will the BBC do next? Will it entice people to break the law? That is not so far-fetched when we discover, as my hon. Friend the Member for Maldon and East Chelmsford pointed out, that the BBC paid £4,500 to a nasty little criminal who should probably still be in jail. Was that in the public interest? Certainly not, according to the person who wrote the guidelines for the BBC, as was mentioned earlier. What all that boils down to is the vanity and arrogance of the programme makers, who believe that they should set the agenda, they should make the news and they should report it.
	The second point that goaded me into making this speech—and, by the way, getting it off my chest—was listening to John Humphrys interviewing Martin McGuiness. John Humphrys is well known as the scourge of politicians. We can all agree with that, and to be fair to him, he was fairly tough with Martin McGuiness this morning—as well he might be, since Martin McGuiness's organisation is almost certainly behind the biggest bank robbery that has ever taken place in this country, and is heavily implicated in the murder of Robert McCartney.
	John Humphrys had good reason to be fairly tough, and he was. Normally, he would not let a politician get a word in edgeways, but he gave Martin McGuinness well over 30 seconds to make an opening statement. Humphrys is normally tough with politicians and, to be fair, Martin McGuinness at least has some accountability in electoral terms. However, as they say in Belfast, even the dogs in the street know that he is a member of the IRA's provisional army council, but Humphrys did not ask him about that. The questions that he wanted to ask were quite tough, but more reasoned.
	When discussing the murder of Robert McCartney, did Humphrys ask Martin McGuinness about the murders that took place in Londonderry when he was head of the IRA there? That they happened is well documented. My right hon. Friend the Member for Hitchin and Harpenden (Mr. Lilley) gave a description in the House last year of an interview that he had with Martin McGuinness in Londonderry in the early 1970s. He said that McGuinness admitted—or boasted, if one wants to put it that way—that he had ordered the deaths of more than 10 Catholics whom he considered to be informers.
	I found the interview irritating because Humphrys did not do what he is there to do. He should have asked the difficult questions, but did not. That is what I mean when I say that the BBC's agenda is set by people like him. Their arrogance when challenged is worrying in the extreme. As I said, though, at least Martin McGuinness is elected, as are we. Like us, he can be held accountable, but broadcasters—pace Hutton—are not accountable, except to the BBC charter and Parliament. Therefore, this debate is our opportunity.

Andrew Robathan: I am always delighted and thrilled, of course, when people give money to charity, by whatever means.
	I turn now to the licence fee, which I consider to be a wholly outdated tax. I resent it, as do a great many others. It is extraordinary and illogical that the Government should force all citizens with a television to pay a licence fee even if they never watch the BBC, for which that licence fee money pays. As my hon. Friend the Member for Maldon and East Chelmsford said, it is now possible to watch television on a mobile telephone. The licence fee has been left behind by technology, as much as anything else, but it has also outlived its usefulness. I believe that it contributes to the BBC's bloated sense of self-satisfaction. We need to move on, and lose some of that bloated organisation.
	Finally, I was asked whether I thought that the BBC was made up of dangerous left-wing radicals. When it comes to bias, it is pretty extraordinary that, some years ago, the Government got away with appointing Gavyn Davis as chairman. He has now gone, of course, but it is alleged that he wept at Labour headquarters when Neil Kinnock lost the 1992 general election. His wife is still an adviser to the Chancellor.
	The BBC also got away with appointing Greg Dyke, a Labour donor, as director-general. He has many attributes, but he too has moved on. In addition, the Government—and it is no good suggesting that it was not their decision—also got away with appointing a former card-holding member of the Labour party as its political editor. That suggests that there is not as much balance as one might like.
	People may say that the Conservative party in government was just as bad, but it was not.

Chris Bryant: The appointment of Gavyn Davis as chairman of the BBC was not a wise move, for some of the reasons outlined by the hon. Gentleman. I thought that he would always have to try to take the side of the BBC, even if that was wrong. There is always a difficulty in appointing someone with a political affiliation to the chairmanship of the BBC, but that does not mean that a chairman must never have had any political views—which seemed to be the way in which the hon. Gentleman was moving—nor do I believe that the BBC should appoint people to senior positions as journalists on the basis of their having or not having political affiliations, or because other people in the organisation have political affiliations that need to be mathematically evened up. It is important that journalists be appointed on merit and nothing else.
	I shall return to the main substance of the debate. We are considering the next 10 years of the BBC. The Government have been entirely right in advocating support for the licence fee. Unlike my right hon. Friend the Member for Manchester, Gorton (Sir Gerald Kaufman), I support the licence fee. Elements of it are regressive, because everyone must pay it, so it falls as a greater percentage of income on the poorest people, but it is a good principle because it enables everyone in the country, whether rich or poor, to watch the best programming. That could not be achieved without a universal licence fee, as can be seen in other countries that do not have the same system of funding and rely more on subscription services for providing the best programming.
	I believe that, although the licence fee may have a regressive tinge, it is important in ensuring—[Interruption.] The hon. Member for Blaby has incited the hon. Member for Maldon and East Chelmsford to further hyperventilation. His therapy has clearly not finished.

Chris Bryant: Yes, so he has no idea whether they are good.
	It is important that the licence fee ensures that something is available for everyone. Historically, the BBC devoted too much of its time, energy, budget and creativity on a particular brand of middle England listening and viewing. It is entirely right that in recent years it has been more courageous. One of the best programmes produced by the BBC in recent years, although it is not much watched or commented on, is "Two Pints of Lager and a Packet of Crisps". Everyone in the Chamber seems to be staring at me as though they had never heard of it. It is a fine programme.
	We have heard reference to the fact that the BBC makes provision for the cultural elite of the land through BBC4 but that it reaches wider audiences through BBC3. If the licence fee is to be sustainable into the future, it is important that the BBC makes provision for young people and people from different ethnic backgrounds, and not simply to the political class that likes to hear itself on Radio 4 at the end of the day or the next morning.
	The licence fee is a good principle, because other methods of funding public service broadcasting around the world simply do not work and are inadequate. Conservative Members have argued that it is important that the licence fee should not be used as a means of rigging competition in the market. They should acknowledge that countries such as Germany, where there is a mixed system with a licence fee and advertising funding, have precisely those problems, but writ large. It is important that the licence fee alone should fund the BBC.
	The system of funding public service broadcasting in Holland was changed recently. The licence fee was abolished, and it is now funded with a percentage of tax take every year.

Chris Bryant: My hon. Friend makes an important point, and I shall come to some of the dangers of a monolithic BBC. My hon. Friend the Member for Cardiff, West (Kevin Brennan) referred to the BBC sometimes being too focused in London. Similarly, in Wales, it is sometimes too focused south of the M4. It is difficult to hear voices from the valleys or north Wales on BBC services.
	There are problems with the licence fee, but we must ensure that there is scrutiny, not by politicians trying to tell broadcasters what to put on television, but by exposing them to the scrutiny of those who pay the licence fee and whom we represent. I do not believe that there is much support in the land for advertising to support the BBC's finances. That would make it more difficult for other commercial operators, and as the Government's consultation shows, people value the fact that the BBC is without adverts. They sometimes become irritated by the BBC's adverts for itself, which we hear too regularly now during an evening's broadcasting.
	The BBC must be big enough to make a difference in the market. When I worked for the BBC, a taxi driver in Brussels asked me who I worked for. When I said the BBC, he said, "I love the BBC and the programmes it produces, especially 'Inspector Morse', 'Brideshead Revisited' and 'The Jewel in the Crown'." I did not like to tell him that none of those was produced by the BBC.
	It is important that the BBC is a large enough organisation and has a large enough pot of money to produce serious quality programmes and to provide competition for quality in the market. That helps other UK broadcasters to rise to a higher standard, because they know that they must compete for audiences on the basis of quality and not just in the bargain basement. However, the BBC should not be a monolith, and one of the problems in recent years has been to ensure that it fulfils its statutory requirement to purchase programming from the independent sector, which can provide the vibrancy, excitement and variety that the internal BBC model simply cannot provide.
	Year after year, the BBC failed to reach the 25 per cent. level, which the hon. Member for Ryedale (Mr. Greenway) referred to as a ceiling. It is intended to be not a ceiling but the minimum. If we are to have a strong audiovisual sector throughout the UK, it is important that the BBC moves further out of London and the M25 circle and commissions programmes not just from companies with a brass plate on a door in Banbury and so on, but from companies that are genuinely based further afield around the country. It should increase the amount of commissioning from the independent sector.
	It would be remiss of me not to say something about access. My constituents do not have access to Freeview, which cannot be rolled out there until the digital switchover. That is why some 70 per cent. of households have already moved to digital through Sky. However, many cannot afford to take out expensive subscription services. Some might say that we now have the Sky Freesat option, but it is a little like the Holy Ghost—I know that it exists, and I have read about it in lots of publications, but I have never actually seen it.

Si�n Simon: Radio Five Live.

Chris Bryant: I am grateful to my hon. Friend because that is precisely the point that I was going to make. The BBC needs to understand that local radio services should mean genuinely local radio services. For example, it is astounding that the BBC in Wales has no ISDN link for people to be able to do interviews anywhere in the valleys or in mid-Wales. That is the sort of issue that the BBC needs to resolve for the future if it is to maintain its regional strength.
	The hon. Member for Blaby mentioned the World Service briefly, and it is an important part of Britain's contribution to the world. One need not talk to many politicians in countries that have experienced dictatorships or restrictions on state broadcasters to realise what an important part the BBC has played, through the World Service, in maintaining Britain's reputation and enhancing human rights. However, I wish the BBC had more freedom to provide a better international television service. Perhaps my right hon. Friend the Secretary of State could address that point when she winds up. I would like to see a BBC television World Service, because that could offer the world something very significant.

Michael Fabricant: It is a pleasure to follow the hon. Member for Rhondda (Chris Bryant), who is knowledgeable about BBC matters, although I do not always agree with him. I share with him the privilege of working under the chairmanship of the right hon. Member for Manchester, Gorton (Sir Gerald Kaufman). I joined the National Heritage Select Committeenow the Culture, Media and Sport Committeein 1992 and I have been a member since, apart from a brief aberration when I joined the Home Affairs Committee.
	The BBC is a subject to which we often return, and it is interesting that in this debate we have come to praise the BBC, not to bury it. Although some hon. Members have expressed their disquiet about individual aspects of the BBC, we all recognise that as someone said earlier, the BBC is the pre-eminent public sector broadcaster, not only in the UK but in the world

Michael Fabricant: Well, I am delighted that the hon. Gentleman has come to visit the Chamber today.
	Not everything is rosy in the garden. There have been changes in the environment, as the right hon. Member for Manchester, Gorton said. In 1998, all broadcasting was analogue, but now more than half of all television transmissions are received digitally. The Government have a programme for analogue switch-off, but as the right hon. Gentleman also pointed out, we must ensure that we do not develop a digital divide that prevents people from viewing television when all analogue transmitters are switched offin the same way that we do not want a digital divide in access to the worldwide web. The Committee addressed that issue in its report, A public BBC.
	The licence fee has been debated since the start of the National Heritage Select Committee. We allat least, all of us bar oneaccept that the licence fee is a regressive tax. My hon. Friend the Member for Maldon and East Chelmsford (Mr. Whittingdale) described it as a poll tax. However, we must accept that it is the least worst way to fund the BBC. No one has so far pointed out the effect on ITV, Channel 4 and Five if the BBC were funded by advertising. The advertising cake is a defined size and if the BBC were to take just a 1 billion slice, let alone the amount it receives at the moment, it would cripple all forms of terrestrial commercial broadcasting, which at the moment offers a counterbalance to the BBC. We may not like that, but it is economic fact.
	I emphasise how pleased I am that the Secretary of State has rejected the ridiculous idea of top-slicing. It would have created real political pressure on the BBC and the Government's wish for
	A strong BBC, independent of government
	would not have been maintained.
	The Government have severely passed the buck on the trustees. Whether the trustees will work as independent arbiters is not the point. The point is that justice has to be seen to be done. When complaints are made against the BBC by individual viewers and listeners, or by commercial organisations who feel that the BBC is competing unfairly, a final adjudication by the governors of the BBC is never seen to be fair whether the BBC is judged guilty or not. My fearindeed, my predictionis that whether the trustees are independent or not, their adjudication will not be seen as fair. The trustees will be seen as an integral part of the BBC, no matter how hard we try to ensure a distance. The only way to ensure that the BBC is seen to be judged fairly is to allow an independent organisation to adjudicate. That might be a Beebcom or Ofcom, although many members of the Committee believed that the latter has enough to deal with without adding the BBC.
	We must also consider the BBC's provision of programming. My hon. Friend the Member for Ribble Valley (Mr. Evans) has asked me to emphasise yet again the good work that the BBC does to encourage charitable contributions, such as red nose day. Of course, the coverage that the BBC gave to the tsunami was one of the reasons why so much money was raised for that. It is worth remembering that the BBC was able to cover that event wellnot just at the time, but in the immediate aftermathbecause of the large number of its broadcasters and correspondents based overseas. Let us remind ourselves that the BBC has more foreign correspondents than CNN, all three American television networksABC, CBS and NBCFox and the Australian Broadcasting Corporation combined. The BBC provides a tremendous resource through not only the World Service, which several hon. Members have commended, but its correspondents, who are seen on television stations in America and throughout the world via news syndication. They promote the values of not only the BBC, but Britain.
	The Green Paper, which followed on closely from the Select Committee report, had a lot of good in it. However, it does not address the main problems that face the BBC or the population's perception of it. I hope that the Secretary of State will be able to respond to those points and, especially, tell us how the board of trustees will be seen to be independent and separate from the corporation's management.

Charles Clarke: I will come to the points on judicial review in a moment.
	On derogating control orders, my hon. and learned Friend is wrong. The proposals on derogating control orders and judicial involvement relate entirely to the judgment on matters of fact to which he refers. On non-derogating control orders, it is not the case that judicial review does not have powerit certainly does. I will come to that in a moment.
	On urgency, there may be urgent cases in which waiting for permission from the court is not an option. In such circumstances, we need to take action immediately. I propose that the Secretary of State should be able to make the order immediately. The Secretary of State would immediately have to certify the urgency of the case on the order, and it would then take effect immediately. When such an urgent procedure is used, the Secretary of State must refer the order immediately to the court for confirmation within seven days. If it is confirmed, the court will then make arrangements for a full hearing.
	I have considered carefully whether urgency can be defined in the Bill and I am advised that an exhaustive list could not be produced. The procedure will be rarely used. The circumstances for use will most likely be when the subject seems likely to disappear before permission could be obtained because he or she had been tipped off or had made arrangements to travel. In case it has been forgotten, I remind the House that that was a specific problem in December 2001, just after 9/11, when a few suspects disappeared just before the part 4 powers came into force. That is a description of what has actually happened rather than of something that is entirely hypothetical.
	We cannot use the arrest and detention power provided in relation to derogating control orders because we have not derogated and do not intend to derogate now. In any event, that power would not be available in relation to non-derogating orders. I believe that the urgency procedure that I have outlined fills the gap. The subject of the order will be able to challenge before the court whether the case was urgent and the use of the urgent procedure will be included in the quarterly reports that the Secretary of State makes to Parliament on use of the control order powers in the period in question, so the whole House will be able to examine the extent to which the urgency procedures have been used.

Chris Smith: Can I press my right hon. Friend further on the court procedure to examine subsequently the urgent decision that he has made? Under his amendment, the court can consider whether the Secretary of State's decision was obviously flawed. In making that decision, can the court consider not just the process whereby the Secretary of State reached his decision but the full facts that he had in front of him?

Charles Clarke: I will not give way.
	I turn to the second issue relating to the amendments from the other place, which is consulting the police on the realistic prospect of prosecution before and after a control order is made. In practice, the police and relevant prosecuting authorities consult extensively on every terrorist arrest to see whether there is any possibility of prosecution. The Crown Prosecution Service in England and Wales, for example, considers all the material and decides whether there is a basis for a successful prosecution, and whether such a prosecution is in the public interest.
	Submissions to the Home Secretary on individual cases for control orders will always include, as they have done under the part 4 cases, written advice on prosecution. Prosecution is always our first option and, as we discussed earlier, that has been demonstrated in a number of cases, such as that involving the shoe-bomber from Gloucester. I have taken account of what has been said in this House and elsewhereI have taken particular note of the comments of my right hon. Friend the Member for Southampton, Itchenand we are looking at whether we can introduce new offences that will increase the number of successful prosecutions of suspected terrorists.
	I recognise Members' concern that the Bill should require me to explore with the police whether there are realistic prospects of a prosecution in any given case before making, or applying for, a control order, and I am ready to do so. My amendments therefore require the Secretary of State to consult the policeat the level of chief officer of the relevant forcebefore making or applying for a control order, on whether there is a prospect of the individual concerned being prosecuted for a terrorist offence.
	The new provisions also require the policein consultation with the relevant prosecuting authority, where appropriateto keep such matters under review once an order has been made. I do not believe that the existence of a control order will preclude successful prosecution at a later date. I remind the House that two of those certified under the part 4 powers currently in place were subsequently charged and successfully prosecuted for terrorist-related offencesan indication that we continue to deal with these matters directly.

Charles Clarke: It is important to acknowledge that special advocates have different views on the point that the right hon. Gentleman sets out. Secondly, it is important to appreciate that we are listening carefully to what special advocates have said about procedural issues. That is why I responded at the beginning of the debate to the right hon. Member for Berwick-upon-Tweed (Mr. Beith)I hope that I got his constituency right on this occasion

Andrew Bennett: Does my right hon. Friend accept that one of the problems with the House being given an opportunity to vote on an order is that such orders are not amendable and therefore that it is not possible for the House to keep part of the Billor part of the Act, as it would then beand to get rid of bits of it in a phased way? It is possible to have a statutory instrument that is amendable. Will he look further at making it possible for us to consider an amendable statutory instrument so that we could shave away parts of the Bill as they became unnecessary?

Charles Clarke: First, I pay tribute to my hon. Friend's service on the Joint Human Rights Committee; and, secondly, I defer to his legal experience. I am not sure whether my hon. and learned Friend the Member for Medway would also defer to his legal experience.

Si�n Simon: I remind my right hon. Friend of what somebody once said of Cavour, that he loved immoderately. I ask my right hon. Friend not to get carried away with concessions and sunset clauses but to bear in mind over the next couple of days that there remain many Members of this place and a great majority of people outside it who do not want to see all these things that lawyers in this place and the other place have been talking about, who believe that my right hon. Friend was right in the first place and that the country should be protected by elected Members of Parliament and Ministers of the Crown, and not by unelected and unaccountable judges.

William Cash: Will my right hon. Friend accept that a sunset clause is the best way to deal with the practical realities that the House faces? Will he also accept that it is incompatible with the principle that he just enunciated for any future legislation on the prevention of terrorism to be made within the framework endorsed by the Bill, namely the Human Rights Act 1988 and the European convention on human rights?

Douglas Hogg: My right hon. Friend has just referred to the law of the United States. Will he remind the House that the fifth amendment to the United States constitution prevents anybody being held in custody without the due process of law?

David Davis: I will make some progress, if the right hon. Gentleman will forgive me, because we are running out of time. I am not too fussed about saying that, with respect, because I have already given way to him twice.
	This particular problem is partially correctible by accepting the Lords amendment, but the Bill is flawed on many fronts and needs a complete rethink. That is not providedlet me deal with the Home Secretary's point directlyby the Government amendment proposing an annual debate. Those of us who have taken part in such debates know that they offer an opportunity only for ratification, not a complete rethink. This Bill needs more than thatit needs a rewrite, not a rubber stamp. That is why the House of Lords voted 3:1 in favour of a sunset clause, with a record majority of 187 votes. That is why the previous Labour Lord Chancellor voted for it. That is why the previous Labour Cabinet Minister, Lord Barnett, voted for it. That is why Baroness Hayman, the Labour member of the Newton committee, voted for it. That is why a previous Home Secretary, Northern Ireland Secretary, Defence Secretary, and Attorney-General all voted for it. And that is why the sunset clause proposal had a majority of 45, without the Conservative votes, in the House of Lords. The proposal is important, not only because the Bill may prove counter-productive, but because there is a better alternative.
	Let me quote the noble Baroness Williams of Crosby, who is not someone I normally quote. She said:
	Finally, in this House, with the possible exception of the Government Front Bench, a clear consensus is already building up about what a new Bill ought to look like. It is not divided on party lines, nor on lines of the particular attitude one may have as regards one's previous interests or concerns. There is clearly a very wide support for a different kind of Bill.[Official Report, House of Lords, 8 March 2005; Vol. 670 c. 650.]
	I say to the Government that it is possible to get the matter right but they will not do that if they insist on trying to use this badly flawed Bill as some strange test of political machismo. Of course they should be tough on terrorism, but clumsy on terrorism is not tough on terrorism. Heavy handed on liberty is not tough on terrorism, and careless of justice is not tough on terrorism.
	The Bill is a bad measure, although it has been improved somewhat by the Lords. I recommend to hon. Members that we accept all the Lords amendments, let the Government use the improved Bill, but, most of all, allow Parliament to write a better one before the year is out.

John Denham: In view of the time, I shall be as brief as I can.
	Let me start with the sunset clause and the remarks of the right hon. Member for Haltemprice and Howden (David Davis). He made several important points of principle about the hundreds of years of liberty that were being set aside and the tests that should apply in the judicial process. However, it is fair to remind him that, when, as a member of the previous Government, he voted every year to renew the Prevention of Terrorism Act, he supported a measure that prevented thousands of British citizens from living in England, Wales and Scotland, with no judicial process or legal standard of proof and none of the safeguards that my right hon. Friend the Home Secretary has suggested. The right hon. Member for Haltemprice and Howden cannot therefore credibly discover a set of principles and concerns about British liberties that he never applied when he was in government. Exclusion orders are similar to the non-derogated control orders.
	My right hon. Friend the Home Secretary has proposed the same type of order with some protection. The question is whether we should apply a sunset clause or an annual vote to the measure. As I said on Third Reading, I believe that the Bill is only a stage in the move towards the sort of terrorism legislation that we need. Many proposals from the Newton report and other suggestions, such as acts preparatory, need to be considered carefully. I would like to revisit my right hon. Friend's decision to rule out intercept evidence, although I agree that it has marginal relevance to many of the cases that we are considering.
	I also believe that we should pursue the concept of the investigative magistrate, although, as a non-lawyer, I am prepared to admit that marrying a principle that has evolved in European continental law with the British system of common law may not be quite so easy. Such a process cannot be completed by November or even December this year. Indeed, if there is to be a general election, there are probably no more sitting days between now and then than there were between the Belmarsh judgment and now. Part of the problem about which people have complained is trying to pass legislation with a gun pointed to our heads because of the parliamentary timetable. It makes no sense to cock the gun now on the measure.
	I was surprised by some of the comments of the right hon. Member for Haltemprice and Howden. I believe that he meant that, in his view, there will not and should not be control orders and that is why he is happy to have a sunset clause because it would provide that they would be with us briefly and disappear. Frankly, he would do better to be honest and vote against the Bill rather than hiding behind a sunset clause.
	Sadly, measures such as control orders are likely to be a feature of our counter-terrorism strategy for some considerable time. We need an approach that does not provide for having them for eight months and then getting rid of them but one whereby they will be part of the framework, which will be better in future. That is why annual renewal and a vote in the House is infinitely preferable to trying to include a sunset clause, which is a dishonest way in which to tackle the issue.

John Denham: A renewal order would not amend the Bill. That point has already been clearly made. I entirely trust my right hon. Friend the Home Secretary, and, indeed, I would trust any of the Opposition parties, were they to win the general election. Everyone agrees that this is not the final word on anti-terrorism legislation. New legislation will be initiated by my party and would be initiated by other parties if there were a change of Government after the election. The issue is to get the rest of the anti-terrorism legislation right, not to introduce control orders for a period of six months, eight months or a year and then drop them. Frankly, if I thought that that was what we were going to do, I would vote against the Bill, because that would be nonsense. There would be no protection against terrorism under such short-term measures. Sadly, we are building a framework of legislation that is likely to play an important part in our lives for 10 or 15 years or more. To set a timetable of only months before scrapping the legislation would be nonsense.

Donald Anderson: Does my right hon. Friend agree that, although the right hon. Member for Haltemprice and Howden happily voted year after year for the prevention of terrorism Acts, a major change has taken place in the security context since then? At the time of the PTA, we did not have suicide bombers or bioterrorists, for example. The nature of the threat that our citizens face is now much greater.

Mr. Deputy Speaker: Order. That is strictly speaking a matter of debate.

Claire Ward: Is the hon. Gentleman aware that his hon. Friend the. Member for Newbury (Mr. Rendel) was on national radio earlier today? He said:
	I personally believe and my party believes that it is worthwhile to have a marginal increase in the risk of terrorism.
	He went on to say:
	I don't think it is very likely that there will be huge amounts of people killed in terrorism.
	Will the hon. Gentleman take this opportunity to distance himself and his party from those outrageous remarksor does he really believe that the risk is worth accepting?

David Heath: My party has never suggested and will never suggest that there is not a real threat of terrorism, which we must address properly.

Claire Ward: Answer! [Interruption.]

Patrick Cormack: Does the hon. Gentleman not think it pretty disgraceful that the Home Secretary, having given us only three hours in which to discuss this vast range of amendments, has now pushed off?

David Heath: I do find it odd, but not unusual given the record of this Government.
	What are the principles that we wish to see espoused in the Bill? First, there is the very important point that a judge, rather than an elected politician, should take decisions on restricting an individual's liberties. I acknowledge that we are making progress in that area, but the Home Secretary is still determined to persevere with what is a very odd positionat least until his next defeat at the other end of the Corridor. He wants to promote this entirely arbitrary distinction between a derogating and a non-derogating order.
	When we had this debate at the last time of asking in this place, it was quite clear that many Labour Members were entirely unpersuaded that there was a difference between derogating and non-derogating orders that required a different judicial process. Yet the Home Secretary is persisting in his view not only that such a distinction is necessary, but that the capacity in which a judge can act in the case of non-derogating orders is limited to judicial review, and that he cannot look at all the given circumstances. I simply do not accept that that is a reasonable distinction. We know that non-derogating orders can constitute a very substantial restriction on an individual's liberties, and we believe that a judge should take such decisions. They should of course be taken on the basis of evidence put forward by the Home Secretary, his having consulted the security services. The Home Secretary is indeed the starting point of this process, but it is the judge in court who should determine whether such restrictions should be made.
	The second principle is the primacy of prosecution. The Home Secretary has repeatedly asserted that it is right that prosecution be the preferred route in the case of any individual whom we believe to be guilty of, or preparing for, terrorism acts. We agree. In fact, that is precisely what the House of Lords said in their amendmentwhich the Home Secretary proposes to delete this evening. Deleting it cannot be right. I accept that an alternative wording is inserted at a laterand inappropriatepoint in the Bill, requiring the police to continue investigating such cases and to satisfy themselves before an order is made. But that gives the Bill a very strange architecture, and it does not reflect the Lords' clear and unambiguous assertion that the Director of Public Prosecutions must be consulted before an order is made. We believe that there should be no ambiguity concerning control orders. They should be for a fixed period, but of course renewable if that proves necessary. The Home Secretary seems to have accepted that point.
	An extraordinary argument has been advanced concerning the standard of proof. The right hon. Member for Haltemprice and Howden (David Davis) described the situation extremely well when he pointed out that these orders are to be placed on people who are probably not terrorists, by definition, according to the standard of proof that is to be applied.
	There are two reasons why I believe that it is not unreasonable to have the balance of probabilities as the test. First, the starting-point should innately be the beyond reasonable proof criminal test and we are coming down from that, not up, on the say-so of the Home Secretary. Secondly, these hearings are to consider material that is not admissible in a court, so there is already a lowering of the standard of proof. I have no quarrel with that. There are circumstances in which that is right, but if we are proceed with it, it must surely be linked in with the balance of probabilities as the very lowest standard of proof that is appropriate.
	That is necessary if we are to ensure due process, which is a critical issue. I note the amendment tabled by the right hon. and learned Member for Sleaford and North Hykeham (Mr. Hogg) and commend it to the House. The issue was explored in the other place and we should continue to explore it. I do not accept that we can buy this pig-in-a-poke whereby there will be rules of court, but we are not allowed to know about them. At the moment, this House is apparently not allowed to share in the draft rules of court that are being prepared. In any case, we are told, this is a matter for the Lord Chancellor, not the Lord Chief Justice. I do not accept that: it should be a matter for the Lord Chief Justice and the rules of court should be clear about the admissibility of evidence derived from torture, for example. We wholly reject the idea that evidence derived from torture should play any part in any British judicial process. I simply do not understand why the Home Secretary is intent on removing the Bill's amended reference to compliance with human rights legislation.
	We believe that if the Government intend to introduce house arrest at any stage in future, it should clearly be a matter for this Houseindeed, for both Housesto determine and that that should be stated unambiguously. We believe that the Government should be actively exploring issues such as the use of intercept evidence in respect of new offences such as committing acts preparatory to terrorism. Sensible suggestions have been made and I believe that the Home Secretary will consider them, which is an essential part of the preparation for what I hope will be a better and more effective anti-terrorism Bill that will be laid before the next Parliament.
	That brings me to my final point, which is about the principle of the sunset clause. The reason for having such a clause is very clear. The legislation is imperfect and it is being rushed through Parliament, yet it needs the proper attention of both Houses of Parliament. It has been brought forward in haste, simply because nothing was done for three years to correct the deficiencies of previous legislation. We now face an unacceptable potential hiatus in our protections against terrorism. That is why we need emergency legislation to go through, but equally why such legislation should lapse. The sunset clause is therefore crucial.
	It is quite wrong to suggest that annual renewal can provide any substitute for ab initio consideration of the legislation. There is nothing to stop the House re-enacting a similar Bill if, in due course, it is decided that that is the right thing to do. The problem with renewal is that that is the only option that the House will have. One can imagine the circumstances in a week's time. The Home Secretary will say that we have no protection against terrorism and ask why Members are prepared to reject the only protection that we have against it. If we only have the option of renewal, that is what will be put before the House.

Kenneth Clarke: I cannot give way to the right hon. Gentleman. I will just complete my five minutes before I resume my place. I realise that he is on the side of the angels but his particular angel is being too naive if he thinks that we are half way near to getting the sort of terrorism legislation that the House should approve, in any circumstances, once it is given the proper time to debate it.

Vera Baird: I regret that I cannot give way, because I have to hurry.
	I shall return to the test in the statute in a minute. However, I wish that we had never even started to talk about Executive detention. We have now moved away from that completely. Talk of Magna Carta has clogged the airwaves for several weeks, but it was simply not necessary. It is a far from perfectly analogy, but the orders are recognisably similar to antisocial behaviour orders. Someone applies for an ASBO, often on hearsay, and information is collated by a local authority noise inspector or by a police officer who was not present when the incidents occurred. Following a complaint that someone has behaved in an antisocial waythey have not committed a crime, but they offer a riskrules are imposed and the recipient of the order cannot go into a particular area, must wear a tag and must be in their home after 10 pm. It is not the same as a control order, but it is in the same ball park. Anticipating that someone is engaged in terrorism, we will require him to follow orders imposed by a court to protect the public from risk.
	Turning briefly to the test, there is a major question to be askedis the standard of proof good enough? We are arguing about two different requirements. Are there reasonable grounds to suspect that someone is a terrorist or is it more probable than not that he is a terrorist? That it is not half as important as the question of whether he can answer the charges against him. In most instances in which there are reasonable grounds to suspect that the guy is a terrorist, that is unlikely not to be the case. If there are reasonable grounds to suspect that he is a terrorist, he probably is one. In my own view, I must tell the House plainly that, where there is evidence providing reasonable grounds to suspect that he is a terrorist, a judge should impose restraints on him to stop him carrying on in that way.
	Far more important than that almost but not quite arcane point about the standard of proof is the condition that the suspect must have the best opportunity to answer the case against him. I have been greatly cheered by the attitude of my right hon. Friend the Home Secretary to reviewing the system of special advocates.
	It is clear that, at present, defendants in this position will not talk to their special advocates because they regard them as appointed by the Attorney-General, who is often their opponent in these very cases. It is imperative that these people should have faith in their advocates and be allowed to pick from a security-cleared list of barristers, so that they have their own choice of person. Then the advocate can see the defendant, take a long and detailed history over the relevant period, then see the secret intelligence and hope that he has the instructions to answer the allegations. If he has not, my right hon. Friend has also indicated that he would be willing to discuss a system where, in that situation, a special advocate lists the questions that he wants to ask and approaches the judge as to whether he may be able to ask them without endangering intelligence. This is as good as it is ever going to get.
	That is extremely reassuring. We all wish people who are suspected of terrorism could be brought to the criminal courts and tried. Now, one cannot do anything else to these people until one has ascertained that they cannot be tried. That, too, is hugely reassuring. I do not see that a sunset clause in November would help anyone at all. There is supposed to be a general election in May. It will take us until June to be sworn in again. By July, we will be in recess until October. A long time for reflection is needed to improve upon the Bill, and November has nothing to do with it. It will be reviewed in a year.

Hazel Blears: This is serious and complex legislation. I think that there is now widespread recognition of a real and serious terrorist threat of a different nature from that which we faced in the past. The amendments put forward today represent significant progress. I am grateful to all my hon. Friends for the constructive way in which they have engaged and the suggestions that they have made. We now have significant judicial involvement in all the orders that we seek. We have consultation with the police on whether prosecution is possible, because that is always our preferred route. We have examined the standard of proof and my hon. Friend the Member for Ealing, Acton and Shepherd's Bush (Mr. Soley) made it clear that we are considering preventive orders, which seek to anticipate what might happen, and assessments of intelligence and risk. I therefore believe that our standard of proof for reasonable suspicion for the non-derogating orders is correct.
	The Bill includes a series of checks and balances. We have proposed annual renewal and three-monthly reports to Parliament on the way in which the measure works. We will have an independent review of how the Bill works in practice. The sunset clause that Conservative Members propose is unrealistic for the practical reasons that my right hon. Friend the Member for Holborn and St. Pancras (Mr. Dobson) set out.
	A sunset clause is inappropriate for another reason: it could send the message to terrorists, who will be watching our debate closely, that we are uncertain about what we want to do to ensure that we have a proper legal framework to tackle terrorism in our country. We have tried to establish a legal framework that balances national security with individual liberty, but it is vital that we convey the message that we want to make this country the most hostile environment in which terrorists could consider operating. That is why we need a series of control orders that are proportionate to the threat that we face and non-discriminatory, in compliance with the European convention. Our amendments will achieve that.
	I ask the House to support our amendments and reject the Lords amendments.
	It being three hours after the commencement of proceedings, Mr. Speaker put the Question necessary for the disposal of business to be concluded at that hour, pursuant to Order [this day].

Question accordingly agreed to.
	Lords amendment disagreed to.
	Lords amendments Nos. 12 and 13 disagreed to.
	Lords amendment No. 15 disagreed to.
	Lords amendment No. 17 disagreed to.
	Government amendments (a) to (f) to the words so restored to the Bill, agreed to.
	Lords amendment No. 22 disagreed to.
	Lords amendments Nos. 27 and 28 disagreed to.
	Lords amendment: No. 31.
	Motion made, and Question put, That this House disagrees with the Lords in the said amendment.[Mr. Heppell.]
	The House divided: Ayes 341, Noes 238.

John Robertson: I too have been fortunate enough to visit VIP On Air. Does my hon. Friend agree not just that it does an excellent job, needs to do more and needs help to broaden its service to the rest of the country, but that Glasgow city council in particular has done an excellent job in subsidising it and finding premises for it?

Rosemary McKenna: My hon. Friend is right. Along with RNIB Scotland, the Guide Dogs for the Blind Association, Visibility and Playback, Glasgow city council played a major role. It formed a consortium to operate and develop VIP On Air. A listeners' forum has also been formed, which regularly gives the station team feedback via an e-mail group. Both the listeners' group and the visually impaired volunteers have representatives on the project board.
	Throughout its brief history to date, VIP On Air has greatly benefited from the support and assistance of BBC Scotland. It helped to recruit the station manager in April 2003 and has provided line-management support since then. BBC Scotland has provided support and guidance on studio refurbishment, and recorded and broadcast a national radio programme to help publicise the station. It also seconded a programmer for two months to assist in the launch of the station. BBC Scotland's training programme is a crucial part of all that and one of the blind volunteers has secured an appointment as a researcher with BBC Scotland.
	Not only is VIP On Air a source of high-quality specialist programmes such as those featuring unabridged talking books, it is a tremendous way of sharing information with blind and partially sighted people that is typically available only in print. Programme content includes detailed read-throughs of daily newspapers, reports on service information from central and local government, changes in transport timetables and what's on and when at the local cinema or theatrenot to mention lively phone-ins and interviews with local and national politicians, celebrities and so on.
	Besides making great programmes that tackle social isolation, VIP On Air has helped to develop the confidence, skills and experience of those involved in the station. Many started as volunteers, but have progressed to become employees of VIP On Air or mainstream broadcasting organisations such as the BBC. There is a problem, however, and I ask the Minister to address it. The station currently broadcasts on the internet, at www.viponair.com, although most of its potential audience does not have easy access to the internet. How many elderly people do we know who can listen to the radio at home via the internet? Not many. I know that we now have many more silver surfers in this country, but thousands are denied access to this excellent service.
	VIP On Air is looking for a chance to reach the 3,000 mainly elderly people in each of our constituencies. It needs a broadcasting platform that its large potential audience can easily access. It has already set up a digital studio in Glasgow, as my hon. Friend the Member for Glasgow, Anniesland (John Robertson) said, with the assistance of Glasgow city council, and it has the staff, volunteers and financial backing. I cannot stress enough the thanks that are due to RNIB Scotland, Glasgow city council and North Lanarkshire and South Lanarkshire councils. To its great credit and in the spirit of a true public service broadcaster, the BBC sits on the VIP On Air board and provides the station with training, marketing and other backing. The programming is good and there is capacity for expansion and further diversification to address a UK audience.
	However, VIP On Air cannot develop further while it is restricted to the internet. It tells me that its efforts to reach a wider audience have been frustrated by certain Ofcom regulations. Given the lack of available AM or FM bandwidth, Ofcom has advised VIP On Air that the only realistic broadcasting option open to it is to apply for a geographically restricted community radio licence. It has indeed applied for such a licence for the Glasgow area. If granted, it will be of great assistance to blind and partially sighted people in Glasgow, but what about the rest of the UK? What about my constituents and those of every other Member?
	The station even investigated whether it could apply for more than one community radio licence and broadcast from its Glasgow studio to a number of areas in the UK. Of course, that would not provide universal coverage, but it would certainly increase reach. However, it was told that it could not. Under current regulations, the nearest that we could get to that is if a large number of radio stations similar to VIP On Air were created, with their own studios, and so on. What a waste of time and resources, given that the infrastructure is there, even if the bandwidth is not.
	These limitations seem unnecessarily restrictive. VIP On Air is a unique and ground-breaking radio station; indeed, it is the first such station in Europe. How much longer do blind and partially sighted people in the UK have to wait to get a chance to listen? Our visually impaired constituents constitute an often isolated and excluded community of interest spread across the UK. Surely the Department for Culture, Media and Sport and Ofcom can offer more to VIP On Air than the possibility of a community radio licence in Glasgow alone.
	I have learned this week that Pure Digital has developed the first voice-enabled digital radio set in the UK. That tremendous development will be much welcomed, but that set can access only existing radio stations that have bandwidth. VIP On Air cannot be accessed as it is available only via the internet. The problem is that VIP On Air is being frustrated in its effort to secure the bandwidth necessary to broadcast to its isolated audience across the UK. I am sure that every Member of Parliament wants their visually impaired constituents to be able to receive this service. I urge the Minister to investigate urgently and to discuss with Ofcom the broadcasting barriers facing VIP On Air, which serves a community of interest rather than a geographical community.
	Additionally, I call on digital providers to carry VIP On Air as part of the large number of radio stations that broadcast via digital television. I can listen to BBC Radio Scotland in my London flat because I have digital television via cable. That would help some of our constituents, but I am certain that most of our elderly visually impaired constituents do not have access to digital television.
	VIP On Air is a charitable organisationthe first and only in Europeoperated on a non-profit-making model and radio could provide the bandwidth to enable it to work throughout the UK. The Government have done much to assist our poorest pensioners, but there are still many who are private people, unaware of how to obtain the help to which they are entitled, or who simply want their lives enriched. VIP On Air can help them achieve that.
	Mr. Deputy Speaker, I began by describing the typical profile of a visually impaired person in the UKa woman in her 70s, living alone on the margins of poverty with no contact with social work services, who has not left her home in the last week, not even to go into the garden. Surely we can allow her to listen to a radio station that tackles such exclusion.